Ex-Prison Officer Pleads Guilty To Four Sexual Assaults

Former Department of Correction officer accused of being a serial rapist pleads guilty.

NEW BRITAIN — A former Department of Correction officer accused of raping several women in Hartford and New Britain pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual assault Thursday as part of a deal with prosecutors.

Under the plea agreement, Kelvin Grisales is facing a minimum of 15 years and a maximum of 40 years in prison when he is sentenced in August, defense attorney William Gerace said.

Grisales, 31, was arrested in March 2014 on charges that he sexually assaulted a woman on Huyshope Avenue in Hartford. According to a police report, Grisales had agreed to pay the woman for sex, but instead pulled out a gun and assaulted her.

After his arrest, DNA tests linked Grisales to three other reported assaults, one in Hartford and two in New Britain, police said. He eventually was charged in connection with all three.

The allegations in the second Hartford case were similar to the first. The victim told police that Grisales picked her up and offered to pay her for sex, but instead raped her at gunpoint in his car, according to an arrest warrant.

The New Britain assaults both took place in the Badolato Parking Garage on Washington Street, where Grisales had once worked as a security guard.

In the first case, the victim, a 42-year-old New Britain resident, told police that she had been walking home from a friend's house when a man in a dark SUV pulled up to the curb and asked if she wanted a ride. He drove her to the Badolato garage and told her he needed to switch vehicles because he was driving his friend's car. After they entered the stairwell, the man "told her he was going to rape her and she was going to love it," according to the warrant. He then began beating her and dragging her up the stairs, ripping her clothes off as he went, the warrant says.

The victim said the man hit her on the head with a black handgun, and that he raped her and "she went blank," the warrant says.

In the second case, a woman told police she had been working as a prostitute in the area of New Brite Plaza when a man in a dark blue minivan drove up and asked if she wanted a ride. The woman got in the vehicle and the man drove her to the Badolato garage, the warrant says. They went into the stairwell and the man pulled out a black handgun, according to the warrants. The victim told police that he waved the weapon at her and said she didn't deserve to live. The man raped her, then ordered her to lie on the floor and count to 20, the warrant says. He fled and the victim ran to a nearby pharmacy where she called the police, the warrant says.

Grisales originally faced more than 20 charges including sexual assault, kidnapping and threatening, according to court records. He pleaded guilty Thursday to two counts of aggravated sexual assault and two counts of first-degree sexual assault.

He is scheduled to appear for a sentencing hearing on Aug. 13, Gerace said.

Grisales was placed on administrative leave from his job at the Hartford Correctional Center after the first arrest and was fired April 16, 2014, according to a Department of Correction spokesperson.